


Dying Stars

by Agent314



Series: Family life [2]
Category: X-Men - All Media Types, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: AU, Alpha Charles, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, Erik has Feelings, Established Relationship, Fluff, Introspection, M/M, Omega Erik
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-24
Updated: 2014-10-24
Packaged: 2018-02-22 06:40:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2498282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Agent314/pseuds/Agent314
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They say that when stars die they don't stop existing; they just become something else.<br/>Erik wouldn't know, since his knowledge of astronomy is very limited and he only knows the phrase from an old poem he can't remember where or when he read.<br/>He doesn't know if he likes it either.</p><p>What he does knows is that the day he died he didn't stop existing; he just became something else.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dying Stars

What happened in Cuba had made him into a whole new man and he still can’t decide if he likes it or not. It’s a sudden change and it comes with a lot of implications for him, things he thought he’d never have to deal with, and the good and bad are strangely similar things.

On one side; he feels weaker than ever in his life.

 It’s like killing Sebastian Shaw was the only thing keeping him going and now that he’s gone; so is his strength. The fire and rage that used to storm in his veins are gone and now the only thing making his heart pump is ordinary blood. No more burning desire for revenge to keep him standing, and he doesn’t know if he’s ever going to get used to the feeling of emptiness that grows inside him minute by minute.

Charles had warned him about it-

_“Killing Shaw will not bring you peace”_

-But he hadn’t listened, he didn’t care; peace was never an option for him.

He knew now that he was wrong; he cared, he wanted peace. He wanted to stop feeling as if the world was burning around him, and that the only way for him to live was to become a hunter and seek the blood of those who had wronged him. He wanted to stop feeling like his life was a tool for others, never mind if he was a weapon of destruction or construction; he just wanted to stop being a weapon.

He’d been a weapon for most of his life, he was never able to call his body and mind his; he was just a toy for others to play with and he had no idea. He had no idea of how much his existence seemed to depend on the hatred inside him, and how that hatred he hadn’t been born with was being fed by other people’s hatred; he never knew how little control he had over his life until that day in a Cuban beach, when he put a coin through Shaw’s skull and his world crumbled to dust.

On the other side; he’d never felt as calm and content in his life.

Erik honestly doesn’t know how to explain it, but getting rid of all the emotions that kept him moving was like taking the weight of the world off his shoulders. He doesn’t have to fight anymore, he doesn’t have to hide, and he doesn’t have to run.

For the first time in his life he can just fall asleep and relax, for there’s no one in the world who can control him the way Shaw did. He can just close his eyes and breathe because he knows Shaw won’t find him, Shaw won’t touch him, and Shaw can’t hurt him any longer because he’s dead.

Shaw is dead.

Shaw is dead and Erik wants to laugh and cry; because he’s dreamed of this day for so long and yet the taste is bittersweet.

It tastes like sour gummies and it makes his head spin, the thought of having nothing to live for and the thought of living freely fight against each other, the idea that he doesn’t have a path anymore and the idea that now he can choose which way to go are at war inside him. There are nuclear bombs exploding in his consciousness and fire is starting to spread in his bloodstream, but this fire is not there to make him burn; it’s there to keep him warm.

Killing Shaw didn’t give him any peace, but the doors it opened to him did. He had options, for the first time ever; he could choose what to be. He could’ve taken Shaw’s minions and started another war against humanity, because they wanted to hurt them and Erik wished sometimes that he could hurt them back. He could’ve taken the momentum and confusion to disappear and never look back; he could’ve become another ghost and died happily with just the thought of Shaw’s blood on his hands.

But he didn’t.

He let the missiles alone and took Charles hand, then bullied Azazel into taking them to a hospital instead of tearing Moira to pieces.  He’d stayed at Charles’ side as the doctors told him he would never walk again and had kissed away his tears and asked for thousands of apologies because he’s been hurt one too many times in his life and even if he took joy into hurting some people, he could never bring himself to hurt Charles intentionally. And as Charles kissed him; he remembered.

He remembered that night when his mother held his hands next to the fire to keep him warm and told him how happy she was that he was like her; an Omega, because that meant there was an Alpha in the world who would protect him. He remembered how she’d told him he was caring and loving by nature and that people would try to make him feel weak because of it, and how she’d told him to ignore them, because those traits only made him stronger. He remembered things he thought he’d lost and only recovered that one afternoon when he stood next to Charles and moved a satellite plate with only his rage, the kind alpha’s support and the warm memory of his mother at the back of his head.

He’d let his walls fall apart for a second and allowed himself to be filled with something other than hate. He went back to Westchester with Charles and the mutants who decided to come back as well (Angel choose to keep in touch but to live somewhere else, along with Shaw’s band of misfits) and decided that if stars had to die for galaxies to be born; he could kill Magneto to let Erik live.

He still couldn’t decide if he liked it or not, but this was the life he’d chosen for himself and no one else was there to push him along a path he didn’t desired or to force him to do things that’d make him hate himself when the sun went down. It was all him and everything he decided to do from now on would be a weight only for his shoulders, only for him to think about; he was finally in control of himself.

“What are you thinking about?” Charles asked, caressing Erik’s hair with such softness that it made him want to cry; no one had ever touched him like that “Are you alright, sweetheart?”

“Yes” He answered honestly and smiled, fighting back the tears of happiness that swelled on his eyes. He still couldn’t say if he liked it or not, but as he let his head fall on Charles’ shoulder with a sigh; he knew he’d made the right decision. “I’ve never been better.”


End file.
